"Mystery" of the missing migrant "children"

More than 130 migrant "children" who have disappeared from UK hotels since the summer are still missing six months later, a minister admitted this week.

Immigration delivery minister Tom Pursglove admitted that just 22 of 154 under 18s who absconded in the past six months have been recovered.

In a testy exchange with the Home Affairs Committee he said that of the 132 still at large 88 per cent were Albanian, and suggested they had been picked off by organised crime gangs.

More than 100 of them have turned 18 since they disappeared, he admitted under questioning from SNP MP Alison Thewliss.

It came as the committee was also told that the Bibby Stockholm barge moored off Portland as accommodation for migrants is costing more than £22million - and that since 2020 just 0.4 per cent of Channel boat arrivals have been returned to their country of origin.